The chairman of Louth County Council has said that unskilled migrant workers should not necessarily be paid the same wage as their Irish counterparts.
In a debate on a motion on the abuse of workers by some employment agencies, Cllr Jimmy Mulroy (FF) said the wage to migrant workers should reflect the lower cost of living in their home countries.
He said the cost of living was higher in Ireland, and while Irish people "need €12.50 an hour, people from Lithuania are doing very well on €8.50 an hour".
Cllr Kevin Meenan (SF) replied that migrant workers "do not fly home at night".
"If they live and work here, they should get the same money [as Irish workers]."
Siptu's branch organiser Paul Bell said he found Mr Mulroy's comments "absolutely shocking and disgusting".
He said the councillor was promoting the right to exploit migrant workers, and the EU services directive "defeated the country-of-origin principle" two years ago.
The motion before the council was proposed by Cllr Jim Loughran (SF), who said the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment had detected 296 incidents in the last three years where people employed by an agency were paid under the minimum wage.
He asked the council to support his motion which asked for the Minister to include the principle of "equal treatment" of all workers in forthcoming legislation on agency employment.
During the debate, Mr Mulroy, who is a businessman in the electrical contracting industry, said people from eastern Europe, where there is a lower cost of living, were often happy on less.
Speaking after the meeting, he said he stood over his comments, but said they were in the context of taking into account the cost of living in the home countries of the migrant workers.
He added that many migrant workers were not supporting a family in Ireland.
Asked whether migrant workers with dependants should be paid more, he replied: "No. You have to be competitive. You can't double their wage because they have brought their family here."
He said many migrant workers "are very happy with €10 an hour" and "it can be equivalent to a month's wage in their home country". If the sentiment of the motion was adopted migrant workers "would not get a job in Ireland" as they would be less employable.
However, he gave his support to the motion, which was passed by the council.